generals6

In previous chapters we examined the relations between Hitler and 20
of his Generals. We continue and terminate our trip in the High
Command of the IIIrd Reich Military with :
Manstein, Stülpnagel, Witzleben & Kleist.

Erich von Manstein was probably the ablest of all German
generals. He had a superb strategic sense and a great understanding
of mechanized weapons. Born in 1885 in Berlin in a family of Prussian
nobility, he was the tenth child of Eduard von Lewinsky but was adopted
by his mother's childless sister, Frau Georg von Manstein. At 13 he
entered the Kadettenkorps and in Berlin did some duty in the Corps of
Pages at the Court of Wilhem II. At 20, he was commissioned into the
prestigious 3rd regiment of Foot Guards.
He was arrogant and intolerant at times and sometimes a martinet, but
he was highly intelligent, with a quicl, clear brain. Behind a cold,
reserved exterior, he was an emotional man who kept his feelings under
control. He had great strength of character, standing up to his superiors,
including the mad Führer Adolf Hitler. It is probably the reason why Hitler
never replaced Keitel [as Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces] by Manstein,
even at the request of Keitel.

HITLER AND HIS GENERALS 6




Field-Marshal Erich von Manstein 1885-1973

He was married in 1923 to Jutta Sybille, daughter of Arthur von Loesch, a landowner in
Silesia. The loss of the family's principal estate to Poland in the revision of the frontier by
the treaty of Versailles influenced Manstein's attitude to the Eastern Question. In 1913, he
entered the Kriegsakademie but in 1914 he had to interrupt this brilliant avenue and was
posted as adjutant of the 2nd Guards Reserve Regiment. He was wounded in 1914 but
he did not command any body of troops during the war. Between the wars he served
continuously on the Staff. His first operational command was at the age of 53 with the 38th
Corps in the invasion of France in 1940 for which he devised the famous Manstein's plan
(see map). His real test was command of the 56th Panzer Corps in the invasion of
Russia where he demonstrated all the best qualities of an operational commander in the
field. His most important principle was that the strategy must be right : if that were wrong,
no amount of tactical brilliance, dogged determination or superiority of moral or material
could compensate for it. This view would constantly put it at odds with Corporal Hitler who
thought that moral and determination would in the end ensure the victory.

His idea was to formulate a plan to meet the strategy but then to give to subordinate
commanders the greatest possible freedom to conduct operations thereafter. It was
basically the opposite of what Hitler constantly did. He thought that if too tight a control was
exercised, opportunities would not be exploited. The strenght of the German army, he
believed, resided in its ability to conduct mobile operations.

In 1935 he was appointed head of the Operations Branch of the
General Staff (Operations Abteilung I) and in 1936 deputy to
General Beck who was Chief of the General Staff. As such he
drew up the plans for the remilitarization of the Rhineland and
for the invasion of Austria and Czechoslovakia. In 1938 he was
promoted to Chief of Staff for the invasion of Czechoslovakia in
1938 and Poland in 1939.

After the invasion of Poland, he blamed the lack of clear strategy
concerning the relations with France and England and he came
out with the famous plan designed to destroy the British and
French forces in two scythe-like sweeps : South, General
Guderian's panzer divisions through the Ardennes forest and
North von Bock's army Group A crossing the Meuse river North
of Mézières. The plan was ill received by the OKH
(Oberkommando des Heeres) but Manstein succeeded in
convincing Hitler in February 1940. On 02-20-1940, Hitler
issued his directive that the plan should be adopted. The full
plan was not entirely adopted but his essentials permitted the
fall of France in six weeks in May and June 1940.

Manstein was paying enormous attention to details and his
skills could be illustrated by the motto "Genius is diligence". He
was an indefatigable worker and a very daring commander as
he proved on June 10th 1940 when his 38th Corps dashed
across the Seine river at Vernon, leaving his subordinates and
superiors flabbergasted. He reached Le Mans on 19 June and
when the Armistice was signed at Compiègne on the 22 June,
he had two divisions across the Loire river. He then became a
legend and was to play a leading role in the operation
Barbarossa.

For the invasion of France, Von Manstein developed his own plan: he
suggested that the panzer divisions attack through the wooded hills of the
Ardennes where no one would expect them, then seize bridges on the
Meuse River and rapidly drive to the English Channel before redeploying and
striking eastward. Thus outflanking the Maginot Line, cutting off from the
French mainland strong French and Allied Armies in Belgium and Flanders.
The plan was nicknamed Sichelschnitt (sickle cut).

OKW originally rejected the proposal. Halder had von Manstein removed
from von Rundstedt's headquarters and sent away to command the 38th
Army Corps. But Hitler, looking for innovative new methods of waging war,
approved a modified version of von Manstein's ideas, that later became
known as the Manstein Plan.

Manstein was one of the best
strategists that the German OKH ever
had

In February 1941, von Manstein was appointed commander of the 56th Panzer Corps. He
was involved in the invasion of Russia in which he served under General Erich Höpner.
Attacking on June 22, 1941, von Manstein advanced more than 100 miles in only two days
and was able to seize two vital bridges over the Dvina River at Dvinsk. The following
month he captured Demyansk and Torzhok. But he was frustrated in his hope of a swift
capture of Leningrad when his Panzer was diverted to the right into forested country where
roads were non-existent. He was again frustrated when the OKH gave way to Hitler's
directives to capture land for economic or political purpose rather than dashing to
Moscow. However he was fully aware of Reichenau's directive of Octobre 1941 that came
in to his hands as Supremer Commander of the 11Th Army and which he reiterated in his
own Order of November 1941. In 1941, an order from the 11th Army was sent to the
Einsatzgruppen stating that liquidations were to take place only at a distance of not less
than 200 kilometers from the headquarters of the commanding general. After the war, he
proclaimed to the Tribunal judging him that he had not been aware of the extermination of
the Jews. One more lie on the German side. And a very big one.

In July 1942 after having been appointed Commander of the 11th Army in the Army Group
South he took control of Sevastopol and was promoted Field-Marshal. In November 1941,
he had signed an order which included the words "the Jewish-Bolshevist system... must
be exterminated once and for all." He will be held accountable of these words by the
Allies in 1949. He was sentenced on December 19, 1949, to 18 years imprisonment by a
British military tribunal. This caused a massive uproar among von Manstein's supporters
and the sentence was subsequently reduced to 12 years. However, he was released on
May 6, 1953 for medical reasons.

In August 1942 he tried again to capture Leningrad but was unsuccessful. His elder son
died in this area while serving in the 16th Army. Since Decembrer 1941, Manstein was
directly under Hitler's command and if he appreciated his quickness of mind and his
energy, he hated his arrogant belief in his own superiority of knowledge and his lack of
understanding of what could or could not be achieved with the resources available and
above all Hitler's incapacity or refusal to establish a clear chain of command. On several
occasions, he told Hitler to his face that the Führer should not carry the burden of being
Head of State, Supremer Commander of the Wehrmacht, Commander in Chief of the
Army and overall commander of the Eastern Front. His arguments always fell on deaf
ears but he was probably the only military man to dare speak that sort of language to
Hitler.

After the fall of Stalingrad to the Russians, Hitler and von Manstein were at loggerheads
about the continuation of the war in Russia. As Paulus had constantly obeyed Hitler's
orders not to withdraw in spite of diffident orders from Manstein who never flew to
Stalingrad to discuss the matter directly with Paulus, the situation was lost and on
January 22 the Russians captured the last airfield available to serve the city. Manstein
thought then about resigning. He rather proposed to Hitler a new redeployment plan to
entice the Russians in the direction of Romania and Hungary when a major counter-
offensive should be launched from the area of Kharkov. Hitler did not buy the concept of
abandoning the oil rich Caucasus area. The result was that Manstein constantly had to
improvise short-term strategies to avert disasters, reacting to the initiative which was left
in Soviet hands. His success in doing so encouraged Hitler to think that he was right not
to believe the prophets of doom.
However Hitler's refusal to authorize withdrawal from the Crimea and the Donetz Basin
proved in the end fatal.

In March 1943, Manstein recaptured Kharkov and Kempf recaptured Belgorod but the
Germans failed to eliminate the salient west of Kursk which was the aim of operation
Citadel during the Summer of 1943. Delayed by one month by Hitler, Citadel lasted only
8 days and was a failure and the biggest tanks battle ever. Manstein then realized that the
last chance of a successful offensive strategy in the East had passed and he convinced
Hitler of the necessity to withdraw to the Crimea which he did with success at the end of
September 1943. But it was not enough and in the following weeks the Russians began
to threaten his northern flank and once more Manstein had to argue with Hitler about the
necessity of further withdrawal. Hitler refused but in November 1943 Kiev was lost, and in
January 1944 Manstein went to see Hitler to explain the global situation. Hitler pleaded for
the formation of a new army with reserves from France and Italy but Hitler had none of it
and in the following months the disaster continued : in February, the 6th Army was forced
back to the Dnieper river , in March, the Soviets renewed a general offensive and by the
middle of the month they were crossing the Dniester river, threatening to cut Army Group
south's communications with Poland. After a week, Soviet forces drew a wedge between
German forces and by this time Hitler had lost all confidence in von Manstein.

On 30 March 1944 he was summoned to Berchtesgaden, awarded the Swords to his
Knight's Cross and told that he was to hand over his Army Group to Colonel-General
Model. The same day Army Group A was handed over to General Schörner. After his
dismissal, he entered an eye clinic in Breslau, recuperated near Dresden, and then
retired. He did not take part in the attempt to kill Hitler in July 1944. He had been contacted
by Henning von Tresckow and others in 1943, but while he did agree that change was
necessary, he had refused to join them, as he still considered himself bound by duty. He
rejected the approaches with the statement "Preussische Feldmarschälle meutern nicht"
—"Prussian Field Marshals do not mutiny." He also feared that a civil war would ensue.

After the war, the British -notably Atlee cabinet- at the request of the Soviets charged him
with war crimes, putting him on trial before a British Military Tribunal in Hamburg in August
1949. He was found guilty of two charges and accountable for seven others, mainly for
employing scorched earth tactics and for failing to protect the civilian population, and was
sentenced on December 19, 1949, to 18 years imprisonment. This caused a massive
uproar among von Manstein's supporters and the sentence was subsequently reduced to
12 years. However, he was released on May 6, 1953 for medical reasons.

Called on by the West German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer, von Manstein served as his
senior defense advisory and chaired a military sub-committee appointed to advise the
parliament on military organization and doctrine for the new German Army, the
Bundeswehr and its incorporation into NATO. Erich von Manstein died at Irschenhausen,
Bavaria, in June 1973. He was buried with full military honors. His memory has been
tarnished by suspicions of anti-semitism.

On February 17, 1943, under heavy security, Hitler flew
in to Army Group South's headquarters at Zaporozh'ye,
Ukraine; just 30 miles away from the front-line. Seen
here, Generalfeldmarschall von Manstein is greeting
Hitler on the local airfield; on the right is Hans Baur and
the Luftwaffe Generalfeldmarschall Wolfram von
Richthofen

Generalfeldmarschall von Manstein discussing the
eastern front situation with Hitler on September 15,
1943, at Wolf's Lair in East Prussia. Also present are
von Manstein's Chief of Staff Generalleutnant Busse,
Generalfeldmarschall von Kleist, Generalobersts
Zeitzler and Ruoff, as well as General der Panzertruppe
Kempf

Russian counter-offensive and gains 1942-43

General Carl-Heinrich
von Stülpnagel
1886-1944

Carl Heinrich von Stülpnagel was born in Berlin in January 1886. He received a
classical education ar a gymnasium and retained for most of his life a quest for knowledge
and a special interest in historical-political and philosophical topics. At school, he showed
an above-average mathematical talent. In n1904 he became a cadet officer in the 115th
Grand Ducal Hessian Life-Guard Infantry Regiment. Prior to 1914 he attended the Prussian
War Academy and went to war as a General Staff officer. At the end of the war, he had
reached the rank of Captain. By 1931 he was delegated to compile the regulations for
"troop leadership" with Ludwig Beck, the most central personality in the resistance against
Hitler. JHe had the reputation of being an officer with outstanding military technical
knowlede, significant operational skills and broad military education.

In 1933 he was a Colonel and called by Beck to Berlin to run the Foreign Affairs branch of
the General Staff tasked with gathering informations about the armies of other nations.
Between 1933 and 1939, Stülpnagel made an outstanding career, became a divisional
commander in 1937 and finally in 1939 General of Infantry and Deputy to the Chief of the
General Staff of the OKW (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht).

It is evident that he realized sooner than his boss, Ludwig Beck, the dangers and
disastrous effects of Germany's military and foreign policies. It is the origin of his later
fundamental opposition to Hitler because he was convinced that the actual war monger of
the regime was Hitler himsefl and not the "radical Nazis" around Goring, Goebbels and
Hess. When later Beck was replaced by his comrade Halder, Stülpnagel was confident that
Halder would react more firmly than Beck against Hitler and his policies : Halder
nourished a vigorous hatred of the Nazi regime and the two men were aiming at Hitler's
removal by an overthrow in order to avoid war. Halder empowered Stülpnagel to prepare
with Witzleben for the eventuality of a coup. But the Munich agreement in 1938 removed the
possibility of such a coup as the threats on peace seem to fade away. Halder and
Stülpnagel were relieved that war had been averted without violence. Therefore between
Munich and the oubreak of war in 1939 the opposition to Hitler remained paralyzed and in
state of collapse.

Von Manstein's frequent arguing with Hitler resulted,
in March 1944, in Manstein's relieving of his
command. On April 2, 1944, Walther Model was
appointed as Commander of Southern Army Group.
Nevertheless, von Manstein received the Swords for
his Knight's Cross, the second highest German
military honour.

Hitler and his Generals

However during those 6 years, the bases for his
uncompromising resistance to Hitler developed. He became
one of Beck's closest confidants and totally approved of Beck's
military views in the early 1930s : swift and massive unilateral
rearmament without restriction by international agreement. In
1934 he resisted the anglo-french pressures against
rearmament and wrote that abandoning it "would only be
interpreted as a sign of weakness in England."

However he finally came to think that "confrontation" was not a
good idea and that it shoud be avoided insofar as "Germany
would be in a worse position than in 1914." He became more
and more concerned with the international repercussions of the
rearmament policy and criticized the "nervous haste and
rashness...of our foreign policies."

General Halder succeeded
Col. Beck as Chief of the
General Staff in 1938. He
held the highest opinion of
his subordinate Stülpangel
:"a nobly thinking, honest
officer of the best old
tradition.. an intellectual
person of high political
interests and tact."

After Munich, he tried however to form a conspiratorial movement in certain circles of the Officer
Corps. Witzleben and Stülpnagel thought that they had at least three years to develop such a cadre
before the next international bellicose move by Hitler. They were wrong in as much as in September
1939 Hitler decided to invade Poland and destroy it. When Hitler ordered the violation of Belgium's
and Holland's neutrality, the General Staff was horrified. A group of activists led by LtColonel Oster
and Colonel Wagner tried to prevent the spread of war to the West. At the end of September 39,
Stülpnager presented Halder with a memorandum proving than the Germans were not capable to
break through the Maginot line. Faced to the determination of Hitler, Halder toyed with the idea of a
coup and was forcefully encouraged by Stülpnagel.

In November, Halder empowered Stülpnagel to start preparations for a coup. But the enterprise
faltered when Halder eventually lost his nerve and called off the plan. At the beginning of 1940,
Stülpnagel suffered from a very severe illness of which he never completely recovered and which may
have had psychosomatic causes. After his temporary recovery he became Commander of the 2nd
Army Corps which was deployed on the right wing of Kluge's 6th Army. He led this corps successfully
advancing across the Somme and Seine rivers to the Loire estuary. At the same time, Witzleben and
his 1st Army attacked the Maginot line and broke through this supposedly impregnable fortified line.
Witzleben was awarded the title of Field-Marshal for this achievement.

After France's capitulation in June 1940, Witzleben became
C-in-C of the Army Group D which occupied the region South of
the Seine. Stülpnagel was seconded to being Chairman of the
Wiesbaden Commission which supervised the implementation
of the armistice. His ideas to topple down Hitler were still very
much alive. He tired to avoid France's humiliation and too harsh
armistice's conditions but his obstinacy earned him severe
reprimand from Berlin.

In 1941 Stülpnagel succeeded his cousin Joachim as Military
Governor of France : in 1940 he had been appointed
Commander of the 17th Army on the Eastern front but he had to
relinquish his position for health reasons. This position in Paris
was under a lot of stress and he was not able to prevent the most
repressive measures against the French, notably the "Night and
Fog decrees." He was, according to Ernst Jünger, very sorrow
and "saw the futility of continuing the war." During 1943 he tried
to re-establish contacts with his former co-conspirators in
Germany. Eventually he played a leading role in the 20th of July
1944 attempt against Hitler alongside with Speidel and von
Stauffenberg. When a little after 4pm on this day, he got the news
that the conspirators in Berlin had begun the coup he acted swiftly
: he issued the order to arrest the leadership of the SS and SD in
Paris.

In June 1940, Hitler visited Paris
with Arno Breker and Albert Speer.
The visit lasted exactly 5 hours. It
was the first time and the last one
Hitler set foot in France. And it was
the only foreign county he ever
visited. Hitler was nothing but a
redneck with no interest in
cultures except in a mythic
Germanic and in the ancient
Greco-Roman architecture and
sculpture.

In 1944, the conspirators around
Claus Graf Schenk von
Stauffenberg saw Erwin von
Witzleben as the key man in
their plans. Whereas Colonel-
General Beck was foreseen as
provisional head of state and
Colonel-General Höpner as
Commander of the Ersatzheer
("Reserve Army"),
Generalfeldmarschall von
Witzleben was to take over
supreme command of the whole
Wehrmacht as the highest
German soldier. von Witzleben,
however, was arrested on 20 July
1944 – the day of von
Stauffenberg's attempt on
Hitler's life at the Wolf's Lair in
East Prussia – upon arriving at
OKH-HQ (Oberkommando des
Heeres Headquarters) in Berlin
to assume command of the
coup forces

His troops executed the order speedily and successfully. But as the coup started to
falter, Stülpnagel began to understant he had played his last card. The SS in Paris were
released on the order of Field-Marshal Rommel who refused to take part when he
learned that "the swine (Hitler) had survived." The same night he sacked Stülpnagel,
advised him to don civilian clothes and disappear somewhere. The next day he was
summoned by the Gestapo, tried to commit suicide by shooting himself but failed : he
was only blinded.

Arrested by the Gestapo, he was interrogated, beaten and hung on 30 August 1944.
Witlzleben was hung on 8 August 1944 and Speidel survived. He was arrested on
Hitler's orders but the Army court of Honour refused to expel him from the Army. Thus he
was spared public proscution by the People's Tribunal presided over by Roland Freisler.
Interned in a fortress, he was freed by the Allies before the SS could dispose of him.
Hitler never admitted that his Generals could be of a different view than himself.

Field Marshal
Paul Ludwig von Kleist
1881-1954

Paul von Kleist was an aristocratic Prussian officer of
the old school. Descendant of a long line of Prussian
generals, he was the product of his ancestry. Thirty one
members of his family held the Pour le Mérite. He was a
Royalist and alienated the Nazis by holding to his Christian
convictions. He was Knight of Honour of the Order of St John
Hospitaller of Jerusalem.

He looked upon the Nazy party with a distate he did not bother
to hide. However he swore an oath of allegiance to Hitler in
1934 and he would never go back on this oath.

Born in 1881, he joined the Army in MArch 1900 as a
Fahnenjunker in the 3rd Royal Field Artillery Regiment and
was patented Lieutenant in 1901 ; he became a battalion
adjutant in 1904 and named regimental adjutant in 1907.

The Knights Hospitaller (also known as Knights
of Rhodes, Knights of Malta, Cavaliers of
Malta, and the Order of St. John of Jerusalem)
is a tradition which began as a Benedictine
hospitaller religious order founded in
Jerusalem, following the First Crusade around
1100, and soon became a Catholic military
order under its own charter, and was charged
with the care and defense of pilgrims to the
Holy Land. Following the loss of Christian
territory in the Holy Land, the Order operated
from Rhodes, over which it was sovereign, and
later from Malta where it administered a vassal
state under the Spanish viceroy of Sicily.
Although this state came to an end with the
ejection of the Order from Malta by Napoleon,
the Order as such survived.

Promoted to first Lieutenant in 1910, he was sent to the War Academy in Berlin. The same year
he married Gisela Wachtel. He graduated for the War Academy in 1911 and was assigned to the
14th Hussar Regiment as a General Staff Officer. In March 1914 he was pormoted to Captain of
Cavalry and was transferred to the Staff of the 1st Prince's own Hussar Reiment.

He spent most of the war on the Russian front where he illustrated himself during the battle of
Tannenberg where Hindenburg and Ludendorff turned back the invasion of East Prussia by the
Russians. After the armistice of Brest-Litovsk, he fought on the Western front during the battle of
Reims and was assigned to the Staff of the 225th Infantry Division in 1918.

After the war, he returned to his family, joined the Reichswehr and held a variety of staff positions.
He advanced to Lieutenant-Colonel in 1926, Colonel in 1929, major-General in 1932,
Lieutenant-General in 1933 and eventually General of Cavalry in 1936. In 1932 he had taken
command of the 2nd Cavalry Division at Breslau, moved his family there and bought a somptuous
estate near there at Weidebrück. He had two sons Johannes Jürgen (1917) and Hugo Edmund
(1921), the eldest served on the Eastern front during WW2.

In 1936 he was responsible for the Army expansion in Silesia commanding three infantry
divisions, several HQ formations and administrative staffs, the 3rt and 4th Frontier Zone
command, para-military units guarding the borders with Poland and Czechoslovakia. However in
1938, the openly Pro-Royalist von Kleist was sent to retirement by the Nazis.

In August 1939, Hitler and his henchmen recalled him to duty and he was given command of the
22nd Corps which fought brilliantly the Poles during the invasion of September 1939. On February
1940, he was sent to the Western front and had command of five of the ten German panzer
divisions which were used to invade and conquer France. He was then supervising the dashing
and impulsive Guderian and it is not a coincidence if the senior Generals of the OKH decided to
appoint him at this position whereas he had never commanded a panzer division before 1939.
His group was given the task to trap the Allies (the B.E.F. and the 7th French Army) against the
sea which he did with great success, notably by creating a gap in the French front of 62 miles at
Sedan.

His advance was so rapid that even Hitler was scared and Guderian furious. He sacked
Guderian who had disobeyed some of his orders. Eventually Guderian was reinstated at the
insistence of Rundstedt and permitted to operate a reconnaissance beyond the Oise river.
After France surrendered, Kleist was promoted Colonel-General. Then he was sent to the
Easter front where he remained for the rest of his career.

In 1941 he was sent to Bulgaria with the 1st Panzer Group earmarked for the invasion of
Greece. But first Hitler decided to topple the anti-nazi junta of General Simovic in Yougoslavia
and to invade the country. Von Kleist performed brilliantly in Yougoslavia. He smashed the
resistance and entered Belgrade in April 1941 alongside with the 2nd SS Motorized Division
Das Reich. Then his Group was sent to Russia for operation Barbarossa. He took control of
Kiev in September 1941 and seized hundreds of thousands (667,000) of Russians POWs. In
October he destroyed the Soviet 18th Army, capturing 100,000 men and 212 tanks, in
November he captured Rostov to be thrown out a week later. It was the first major reverse
German forces suffered in WW2.

Then Kleist played the major role in the battle for Karkhov in May 1942 when he saved Paulus
from extermination and captured 239,000 Russian soldiers. During the summer offensive of
1942 he spearheaded the thrust towards the Caucasus and the Baku oil region. During the
struggle for Leningrad, he advised Hitler not to use the Romanian, Italian and Hungarian
troops but Hitler did not listen : he was more or less forced into a defensive strategy until
February 1943 after the fall of Leningrad.

However he was very successful in wining over a lot of Russians to fight Stalin : 825,000 men
were recruited to fight the Soviet army, notably Cossacs, Uzbeks and Kalmucks. Fritz Sauckel,
the infamous Head of Labour Allocation, protested to Hitler against Kleist's "humane policies".
He even summoned to his HQ SS, Gestapo and Police officials to tell them that he would not
tolerate any excesses in his zone of command. He was even praised by Paul J Goebbels.

Victorious German troops parading
down the Champs Elysees in June
1940 after the blitzkrieg operated
successfully by von Kleist and
Guderian

Kleist could held the Kuban until September 1943 when his 17th Army was allowed to withdraw
which he did very successfully even repelling Soviet attacks with severe losses for the
Russians. After the Kuban evacuation, the 17th Army was assigned to defend the Crimea.
This last campaign for Kleist was marred with constant frictions with Hitler who refused all the
tactic moves proposed by Kleist. At the beginning of 1944, he was pushed behind the river Bug
and ordered a complete retreat putting Hitler in front of a virtual fait accompli. But the incident
cost him his career. Exasperated by Kleist constant deeds of disobeyance and revolt, by his
Chritian views, his decent treatment of Russian "subhumans", his Monarchism, Hitler sent an
airplane to Kleist's HQ to bring him back and MAnstein to Oberslaberg : both of them were
granted the Knights' Cross with Oak Leaves and begged to go into retirement.

Even now, Kleist asked Hitler to make peace with Stalin and end the war while Germany could
still hope for acceptable terms. Hitler answered there was no need to do so because the Soviet
army was almost exhausted. Kleist went into retirement at Wiedebrück where he was arrested
by the Gestapo in connection with the attempt against Hitler's life in July 1944. But the Nazis
knew he was not directly involved and did not dare to put such a heroic figure before the
People's Court. They released Kleist and let the matter drop.

In 1945 the Russians invaded Breslau and he fled to Bavaria with his family. Eventually he was
taken into custody by a US patrol, handed over to the Yougoslavs in 1946 and kept in prison
during the next nine years. In 1948, he was extradited to Russia where he was charged with
having "alienated through mildness and kindness the population of the Soviet Union." The
Soviets never forgave him to have recruited so many Russian subjects to fight against them.

In March 1954 he was transferred to the Vladimir Prison Camp, a prison for German Generals
located about 110 miles East of Moscow. He died there of arteriosclerosis some months later.
Paul von Kleist was one of the most able and most liked Generals of the German armies and
he paid the price for his courage in front of Hitler and his kind attitude towards his enemies.

Even little Goebbels, minister
of Propaganda, praided Kleist's
humane policies in the East
during operation Barbarossa

The Tigers built an impressive record in Russia
during 1943 and '44. They destroyed
tremendous amounts of enemy equipment and
often just the sight of a Tiger would induce the
Russian tankers to withdraw. They had similiar
success in North Africa and Italy, creating a
powerful psychological effect on Allied troops.
On Feb. 1, 1943 the British captured a Tiger
intact and subsequently performed exhaustive
tests on it. To their dismay, they found the
Tiger was indeed an excellent gun platform
and extremely well protected from all but their
biggest anti-tank guns.